Best way to save cd collection?

S7horton,

Please give me a ball park cost estimate for this setup. Will the remote adjust the volume too? Any negatives? I'm assuming this will rip in lossless format?

Rocky,

I am interested in the answers to your thread. I am looking at the same thing. Issues are
1) Large collection
2) Lossless storage
3) accurate ripping
4) Back up (I am thinking RAID 1 - which means everything is duplicated on two drives to ensure no loss of music collection + one additional drive to hot swap - i.e triple backup)
5) Jitter (got to find a way that minimizes this)
6) Bit transparency (make sure no pesky software digital volume control, EQ, sample rate converter or other software bug undermines the sound)
6) Wireless (everything should be accessible from a remote or laptop - no wires to connect - storage media should be in a utility room where I don't hear the hard drive fan)

So far: I'm thinking of storing the music collection in Apple Lossless on a LaCie 2TB 2Big NAS connected to a Wireless Router. A macbook would wireless access the storage and Itunes would wireless serve the music to an Apple Express connected by TOSLINK to a asynchronous sample rate converting DAC.

I do not want to hijack your thread but I'll be reading all the comments with interest.

Shadorne,

Appears we have the same goals. I don't need capability for multiple rooms. I just want to rip & play my library of cds thru my high end system via a remote at my listening chair. After searching online, there seems to be no concensus on how to best achieve this (on a tight budget). I'm just praying that any advice will be very simply stated so I can understand it. Case in point, I have no idea what a LaCie 2TB... is and how to utilize it.

http://www.audiocircle.com/index.php?topic=51326.0

I have attached a link to a forum site where people post descriptions of there Mac Mini servers. It can be a great help while researching what fits your needs.

Mac Mini are easy to set up and use but it can get pricy. Window's based computer/servers are getting just as easy these days and will not cost as much but can required a little more computer know how.

FYI: a LaCie 2TB... is an external hard drive used with some music servers for music storage. Most music server do not have large internal hard drives.

I second the PC based storage idea. I am also interested in the Perfect Wave Transport and Perfect Wave DAC from PS Audio. They use outboard hard drives to store music. The PWT stores the CD in RAM so there is no jitter and uses I2s over HDMI to transmit the raw digital data to the DAC. The system will also play downloaded high quality DVD music discs. They are backordered at this time but they still have a trade in deal at up to $1000 off for a limited time.